DELAND — Huge pins that hold the Whitehair drawbridge together between Volusia and Lake counties really have nothing against working on Fridays, it just seems as if they do, say Florida Department of Transportation administrators.

For the second time in three weeks, the pins failed to operate and forced the drawbridge on State Road 40, a major artery between the counties, to close on Friday.

The bridge over the St. Johns River was back in operation before noon, slightly more than two hours after the pins failed. When the pins wouldn't budge May 6 -- also a Friday -- the bridge was closed for most of the day.

''It's just one of those things,'' said Bill Markert, bridge tender supervisor for the transporation department's District 5. ''It's almost impossible to tell when it's going to happen or if it'll happen again.''

And when it happens, motorists don't have much choice but to wait it out. It's ''quite a long ride'' to get to another bridge over the St. Johns, he said. If it seems the bridge is going to be closed for a long time the department tries to inform drivers via radio to take another route, he said.

Some people don't like to wait even three minutes; others take it in stride, he said. One time when the bridge was stuck, a woman was on her way home from the grocery store with ice cream bars. Because there was no hope the frozen treats would last ''she got out and handed them out to all the kids in the cars.''

Like May 6, the bridge shutdown Friday caused traffic to back up for about a mile on either side of the river. Traffic was stalled for an hour.

The locking pins slide out of and into place on either side of the bridge when it is opened or closed. When in place, they hold the two spans of the drawbridge together and strengthen the structure when traffic passes. On Friday, the electric system that pushes the pins in place stopped short of locking them in position.

That was a relatively minor problem compared with May 6, when the pins jammed and bent the electrically-operated arms that move them, Markert said.

This week department electricians were in Daytona Beach and had to travel about 45 miles to reach the bridge when the problem first began at 9:20 a.m. Once they got there, they got the bridge open to traffic by 10:20 a.m. But then they had to keep making adjustments to the locking pins, Markert said.

The bridge periodically was closed to traffic, once for almost 45 minutes, during adjustments.